Democratic Rep. Glenn Appeals to Attorney General as House GOP Refuses to Turn Over Public Records

Representative-Elect Jim Glenn has filed an Open Records Appeal with Kentucky’s Attorney General as a result of Republican House leadership refusal to turn over information that may show whether they used staff attorneys to interfere in the election challenge requested by former 13th House District candidate D.J. Johnson.

Glenn’s attorneys filed an Open Records Request on December 17, 2018, to determine whether Speaker-elect David Osborne has interfered in the process. Glenn is questioning whether the GOP used taxpayer resources to pay for partisan counsel in Johnson’s attempt to unseat Glenn.

Kentucky Open Records Law requires that the custodian of records respond within three (3) days. Six (6) days have passed since the filing of the request and there has been no response from the custodian of records.

“Public records will quickly show any wrongdoing, but unfortunately the House has failed to turn over those documents,” said Anna Whites, Glenn’s lawyer. “Jim Glenn will ask Attorney General Andy Beshear to review this violation of the Open Records Act. This is a public election being undercut, and we need answers immediately,” Whites added.

The bipartisan State Board of Elections performed a recanvass and has certified the results. Despite these efforts, Johnson has requested that Kentucky Republicans overturn the results and declare him the winner.

House Speaker-Elect Osborne has refused to commit to seating Representative-Elect Jim Glenn in January telling the Associated Press it is “solely the prerogative of the House of Representatives to seat a member” and that he “cannot commit” to how the Republican-dominated House of Representatives will vote on the matter.

“You can’t use public money for personal political ends, that’s illegal,” said Glenn’s Attorney Anna Whites.

“This whole Election Contest was brought improperly, and the Constitutional Law Professor overseeing the process must correct that. We have a duty to the taxpayers and cannot let that go unchallenged,” Whites said.

Salamanca has not said whether he will advise the House to turn over the records or fight to keep them secret and is failing to address basic fairness issues as he works closely with Republican House Leadership, whose staff wrote and filed the Election Contest.